


The Tenant

by MarisFerasi



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: A Zira Fell, AU- human, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale's Name is Zira (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley has a lot of sex toys and uses them, Crowley is Bad at Flirting (Good Omens), Crowley is a tenant in Zira's building, Crowley is an online sex worker, Crowley loses his job, Dildos, Fucking Machines, Genderfluid Crowley (Good Omens), He/Him Pronouns For Crowley (Good Omens), Knotting Dildos, Lockdown Fic, Lots of masturbation, M/M, Mutual Pining, They are middle aged, Ubiquitous Luc ex, Zira hates customers, covid pandemic fic, crowley has a Comfy (tm), fleshlight, industrial bottles of lube, shitty exes, tags are out of order, they were roommates trope
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-19 07:34:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29622801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MarisFerasi/pseuds/MarisFerasi
Summary: They Were Roommates Human AU Trope set during Lockdown 2020:Crowley got kicked out by an ex a few months ago and has couch surfed his last wave of his few friends' benevolence. He finds a listing for a bedsit in Soho and goes to check out the place, and finds the fussy little angel of a landlord quite charming indeed. He moves in and they quickly become friends, but both desire more and pining ensues. The real issues begin when Crowley loses his main job during major cutbacks because of the pandemic, and has to rely on his side hustle of online sex work to pay the rent, and Zira finds out.What will happen? Will the two part ways? Will Zira ask Crowley to leave when he finds out his "dirty little secret"?
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 96
Kudos: 99





	1. Meeting the Landlord

**Author's Note:**

> This is a human AU that takes place during lockdown 2020 and deals with certain anxieties and economic fallouts that are happening in our world because of the pandemic. Crowley loses his job and has quite a panic about it and Zira helps him remain calm by reminding him that his housing situation is, at the very least, safe and stable. That's really the most "scary" or potentially triggering thing here. Crowley does do online sex work as a side hustle in the beginning and then as his main job eventually, and this fic is not intended to in any way put down sex workers. 
> 
> This fic is 100% "They Were Roommates Oh God they were ROOMMATES" trope, and is not intended to cause anyone any sort of anxieties about the Hell Year of Our Lord, 2020. 
> 
> The lovely Too-Funky on tumblr has been helping me with UK life on the ground facts to cover life in the last year, as I am in the US and only know what I see on the news and our beloved Staged, which is not necessarily the best snapshot of daily life for the average Brit.

November 2019 

A. Zira Fell was, by all his neighbors' accounts, a fussy, quiet, and predictable middle aged gay man. He lived above his shop in a three-story, 200 year-old building in Soho, London. It had been an old family business which he had turned from a failing series of miserable bedsits into a carefully curated antiquities and restoration business with two smallish apartments above it. He had his regular, dependable clients and some word-of-mouth and he could pay his bills and his taxes were immaculate, and that was that. 

The shop had, in the days of the declining aristocracy and the Great War, been turned into a series of oddly-shaped, subletted apartments cobbled together rather poorly by an uncle trying to make the most of a bad situation. But at least he hadn’t sold the property. 

The electric was shotty at best and still had meters that ate 20p coins in some rooms in order to operate, but there were fireplaces and flues in each bedsit and a kitchenette and toilet too, which is more than most could hope for in such housing in some similar places. More recently Zira had updated the internet from one ethernet cord running directly to his computer to a router with wireless. He also had the plumbing redone from the old lead pipes that had been in place (and which sometimes caused the downstairs sink in the basement to overflow if more than 2 persons were using water at once in the whole building) to a more streamlined, PVC option that kept everything working nicely. 

Zira’s own rooms consisted of a bedroom and a larger sitting- room- slash- kitchen which had a living space which housed two chairs by the fire grate and an ancient leather chesterfield pushed between two dusty bookshelves. Along one wall trailed the worktop and appliances. The kitchenette was hardly more than a long beige vinyl worktop along a wall with a hot plate and an electric kettle and a small sink, but it suited his needs just fine. He was, after all, alone. He ate out more often than he cooked in, too. There was a small refrigerator and a narrow oven tucked neatly under the worktop. 

The kitchen and single toilet shared a wall with the neighboring set of rooms which actually shared both cooker ventilation and plumbing with Zira’s own. The electric panel boards flipped if both ovens or even two kettles were going at once, but it was often not a problem. Zira didn't eat in much. 

After a youth spent in the shop below, taking inventory of the books there and repairing the most priceless of them for huge profit, Zira’s mother had gifted him the deed when he was old enough to manage a business on his own and left him to it. He happily took the profits from selling first editions to reliable collectors and repairing family heirlooms and had the lower half of the building meticulously reconstructed to 1800s standards until it resembled a proper shop again, instead of his great-uncle’s awkward bedsits. He left the upper floors as they were with every intention to do them at a later time, but renting them seemed like a profitable idea, and so he had tried that first. 

He had enjoyed the extra income in lean times, and the social company the tenants could provide if they were all feeling rather lonely, which was an unfortunately easy sensation to come by in central London. He had, for a number of years until recently, rented the larger flat out to a young woman and her partner, but they had bought a cottage in Oxforshire and moved out a few months ago. Something about needing room to study occult forces and garden and maybe make babies. 

So now the flat was empty and Zira was starting to feel the hollowness of the building like an ache. He didn’t often need company, but _not_ having anyone around when he _did_ want something even as simple as conversation and a nice charcuterie was its own sort of torment. So, with a grim sort of inevitability about him, he put the hand-lettered For Let sign in the street-facing window of the available rooms and posted a few images and a short description online, requesting a single or couple with no children (the books, after all, came first) tenant(s) who was easy to live with and were reasonably tidy. No animals were preferred but could be negotiated, and the utilities would be divided based on average usage differences after the first month of cohabitation. 

He thought it was ultimately a thorough, fetching listing. 

By the end of the week, he had spoken with and turned down numerous people who were clearly unfit to share rooms with him and his extremely priceless effects. Even if the safes were heavy and ancient and impossible to crack and the most expensive things were under heavy lock and key in his own rooms, there was always room for being overly-cautious. He had to wonder if some had even _read_ the agreement before calling him or coming directly to the shop for an interview. A few had demanded to see the rooms and were quite rude, as if that was going to get them anywhere. Each had been turned away cooly and effectively, and had slumped off into the ubiquitous London rain. It was becoming exhausting, searching for someone to whom he could let the rooms, but he knew he had to prevail or find more customers for repair and restoration jobs in order to pay the bills, which only led to more work stress in his experience. 

And dealing with his best-paying long-term customer Gabriel was anxiety-inducing enough.

So it was more internet scrolling and email-answering and phone calls and interviews and showing the room to the few parties he could deem decent enough to let the place to. No one had agreed after seeing the oddly-shaped rooms and the tiny kitchen and the suspect ventilation above the cooker and the meters that still took coins on some outlets. He had to admit, the apartment was suited to more of a single person, but not many could afford the rent on their own. It was, after all, prime real estate; even if he was pricing it well for the area it was still steep. More than one suspicious, dark-suited pair of individuals had come by and tried to “take the place off his hands” during Zira’s stay here. 

When Zira opened the shop door on friday afternoon to find a skinny, damp, black-clad ginger man with dark glasses on his doorstep muttering to himself, he thought, “oh great, another one.” 

And he wasn’t exactly wrong. Except he really, _really_ was. 

“Oh, uh. Sorry. ‘M Crowley,” the man stuck out his hand and let Zira shake it with a tight smile and then usher him inside out of the mizzling, freezing rain and to a table where a fresh-steaming teapot was sitting, alongside two clean cups. “‘S Anthony, really. Anthony J. Crowley, but uh. Nnn-no one calls me that, ‘s just Crowley.” 

“Alright Crowely,” Zira said, stacking his papers together and sitting in his chair opposite the other man. “Have some tea if you like, this should be a simple enough conversation.” 

“Oh, ta,” Crowley sighed, pouring himself a cuppa. He gestured with the teapot and Zira nodded, watching that lean arm pour a second cup and then set the teapot back under its fussy little cozy. He added far too much honey and drank it down with such speed he could hardly have tasted it, but Zira said nothing beyond arching an eyebrow. He watched Crowley eat two biscuits in much the same manner and decided to get started. 

“So, what do you do for work, Crowley? Is your income stable?” 

“Oh, yeah. I mean, it’s… uhm. I work from home, so it’s all online. So I need a reliable internet connection. But I see you have a computer, so you must have some sort of connection here. I’ll pay for any add-ons or upgrades I may need, 's no trouble. And yeah, it’s stable. I have a regular nine to five and then a few side hustles to stow away in my retirement accounts. I, uhm… pull the work I want and if I need a holiday or somethin’ I take one. Simple enough. And I read your whole advert. I’m quiet, clean, single, bi, et cetera. ‘S just me and my cat, Bentley. Used to have a snake but my uh…well, ex I guess, uh _-_ took 'em in the split, which is why I’m looking for a place. Ran out of couches to surf on,” he gives a hollow bark of laughter and fidgets. Zira winces against a stab of sympathy and listens. 

“I have a car, so I guess I’ll have to figure out where to put it. I don’t have any family to bring through here and jack up your bills with long stays, or many friends who’d spend more than one drunk night on the sofa. Probably none, actually. They all have places, heh. But yeah, pretty predictable and old and basic, me. I like strong coffee and bingeing telly and taking naps and good food and wine. And if you like those things maybe we can set up like a weekly dinner or something to chat, I dunno.” Crowley removes his glasses and shrugs, glancing around the shop with an anxious sort of expression. It hits Zira that he fully expects to be tossed out. There is no telling how many landlords have told him _no_ recently. 

But then- and Zira can remember this moment clearly in the future when he talks to Crowley or when they laugh together on the chesterfield sharing wine or eating dinner or whatever- _then_ , Crowley looks up and smiles with a charming sort of anxiety trembling at the edges. And his eyes-- his eyes are something that will be seared in Zira’s brain forever, even when he eventually leaves like they all do. 

Crowley's eyes are a bright burnished brass around the edges, lush, antique gold at the center and deepening towards the pupil to a deep brown in streaks like old vines creeping out of a well toward the sunlight of his irises. Zira is at once fascinated and shocked, having never seen eyes that color before. It’s entrancing enough that the next words spill out unbidden. 

“Would you like to see the rooms, Crowley?” Zira stands and ushers the other man toward the stairs, showing him where the street entrance is at the back of the shop that goes straight to the upper hall and where the doors separate. “This is my side, here. You’d be over here,” he unlocks a blank eggshell-beige door and pushes it open. Crowley goes in and Zira follows a few steps behind, letting the man take in the space while he lingers in the doorway by the kitchen worktop. 

It’s not a terribly impressive space, but ZIra is offering it at a good price given it’s prime location. Just two small bedrooms and a toilet and similar kitchen to his own, with a few cupboards and a small refrigerator and a narrow cooker, a sink in the worktop along one wall of the sitting area. There is one narrow, exposed linen cupboard in the space between the bedrooms and one small closet in one of the bedrooms and not much else, but Crowley doesn't seem to have anything negative to say or any questions other than if he has hi-speed wifi and whether the IP is encrypted. It is not, to either, and Crowley offers to have it added to the current bill and then added to his rent. It is, apparently, integral to his work that neither the IP nor his laptop be pregnable by at-home hackers.

Zira nods, not exactly understanding, and stands awkwardly by the kitchen to wait while Crowley sticks his face into each room and the toilet and comes out, grinning. “Very nice. And what d'you know about parking ‘round here?” 

“I do have one dedicated space behind the shop, sort of in the alley? It's by the skip. And i don't have a motor. You may have to move it now and again for my larger deliveries, but it shouldn’t be a problem to park there, if your vehicle fits beside the bloody thing.” he points out a small window that faces out into the alley at an angle and Crowley follows his direction, peering into the damp din below.

“Fantastic, yeah. It’s just a shitty little compact, it’ll fit anywhere.”

“Well then, Anthony Crowley. I’ll go fetch the lease agreement for you to llok over and you can move in when you get the deposit and your first month ready.” 

“Oh! I got it, here ya go,” Crowley fumbles in his pocket and pulls out a roll of notes. He counts out the amount for two months’ rent; the deposit and the first month worth, and hands it over easily enough. “If I need a special sticker for the parking, let me know. I know the city can get weird with permits sometimes.”

Zira stares down at the cash and glances back up at Crowley and smiles. “I’ll just go get the paperwork, one moment, please. Make yourself at home, and all that.” 

“Mind if I go get some boxes while you get that? And the cat? Everything’s in my car,” Crowley says, that bashful note back in his voice, and Zira nods. 

“Of course. And go ahead and park,” he nods toward the alley. 

Zira goes into his own flat across the landing and watches Crowley slip out and down to the road. He goes to another window and watches the redhead move a battered red Yugo into the narrow alley and beside the skip as directed and then step out, stick his head and shoulders into the car and pull out a pet carrier and all the pieces of luggage one person could feasibly carry and turn back. He doesn’t have a key for the outside alley door yet, so he has to come round the building and in through the shop again. 

Zira meets him on the landing with the papers, which Crowley takes and signs with barely a glance against his ( _his_!) worktop. He shuts the door to the landing, bends gracefully, and opens the carrier. A black streak shoots out and into one of the bedrooms. 

“Ah, well. That’s Bentley. She’s sort of a weirdly sentient little arsehole, but then again aren’t all cats? Honestly you may never see her again, she's flighty with everyone but me.” Crowley chuckles and hands Zira the paperwork back. “Thank you, mate. 'S a nice place. I hope we come to like one another.” 

That, Zira thinks, is not going to be a problem. He’s charmed right down to his toes, and is rather thrown off by the sensation. He smiles back and offers to help Crowley bring in his last few boxes and they lug up one more large chest of something rather heavy together. After that he makes to leave the other man to his unpacking and settling.

“Hey,” Crowley calls, getting Zira’s attention as he’s closing the door. He’s left the keys to the back door and the flat on Crowley’s worktop and he points to them now, thinking that's what Crowley is after. 

“Yes?” 

“Shitty pizza and wine later? My treat. It’s a moving tradition, yanno?” Crowley shoots him a devastatingly toothy grin full of uneven, gleaming white teeth and Zira feels effervescent out of nowhere. 

“Ah, yes, of course. Wouldn’t want to stand in the way of tradition. Certainly, my dear. I’ll just be working a bit downstairs, come get me when you’re ready. Or if you need a hand bringing anything else in. The key to the alley door is on your key ring, there. It’s the gold one, the two silver are your door and a copy.” Zira nods and closes the door behind him, sighing heavily against the weight on his chest. 

Holy shit, his new flatmate is kind, and terribly attractive, and what _exactly_ has Zira gotten himself into? 

_________________________________

Crowley unpacks his boxes and moves things around, dragging the heavy chest and one hastily rolled-up li-lo into one of the rooms. He pushes the other boxes into the other room. He removes a new, thicker li-lo from its packaging and inflates it to act as a stand-in until he gets a proper bed. He goes to his boxes and starts to organize the clothes there, as well as setting aside his dirties from the past week at Harry and Liam's mouldy C-flat. He considers washing everything to give it a better smell after being there and weighs the decision to exasperate Zira early on against having fresh clothes. He decides he'll ask about the washing over pizza later and moves on to organizing the rest of the place a bit better. He'll have to go get furniture and shelving soon, after the bed. A bed is priority. And maybe a tree for the cat. 

The thing about being abruptly made homeless is learning what things matter and what things don’t. It turned out that his bank card and mobile and a kit bag and backpack of clothes and the cat had been the most important things. Luckily the car and bank account were in his name as primary, so it was easy to shut Luc out of the bank and take the spare keys for the Yugo. Luc had kept his beloved snake, Ashtoreth, out of spite but also out of convenience. Crowley could hardly find a place to take _him_ in, let alone a six foot snake that ate full-sized rats and knew how to get out of its terrarium. 

So yeah, Luc had kicked him out with little warning or warmth and he’d had to grab what he could. The bank account was easily closed off since it was in his name, and luckily Luc hadn’t taken too much out before giving Crowley the boot, but loss was loss. He’d be working for months to replenish the savings his arsehole of an ex had stolen over time, right under his nose. He could have easily retired at 60 as planned, but with the losses he'd sustained it would be a much longer climb to that endgame. He wasn't sure he could replenish those funds in roughly twenty years, but he was damned sure going to try.

Unfortunately, daytime data entry for an insurance firm and writing research papers under the table for a few of the local university kids didn’t pay much, so he’d ventured out to other remote jobs he could easily do in his spare time online, and _still,_ finding a place to live in London on single income was proving nearly impossible. 

At first it had been easy, just writing up HOH-friendly subtitles for YouTube and TikTok videos, which turned into reviewing films and shows for Netflix and the like. Nothing seemed to stick for long, and the university kids had just left for winter break, which meant no income for a month from The Them. As much as he loved returning to his roots and writing up physics and astronomy papers, it wasn't a viable source of income.

He had only started looking at more illicit veins of income when he moved into Tracy's spare room for a few weeks. He had baulked, and then felt bad for it considering who he was talking to, and then immediately ran into several mental roadblocks. The main problem with couch surfing was that he hadn’t had much privacy, and the best paying of those sorts of jobs required space and… _exposure_. Tracy told him to look into online anonymous sex work, which is how she found some of her more discerning gentlemen, and that had gotten the ball rolling (after his initial horror at the entire bloody idea). 

He’d started off simple enough, selling feet pics and some nude photos that had led almost immediately to short videos of himself rubbing one out, careful to keep his face out of the shots and no incriminating silhouettes. But someone had quickly offered him a hundred quid to dance and strip for ten minutes over webcam and he thought, _well, that’s not so bad_. He knew he had a nice body and a decent package and he wasn't shy about bottoming, but something about doing it for a camera was disconcerting in the beginning. 

So he started an Onlyfans account and started digging into what he could do from home and not humiliate himself. The last two months surfing between Tracy's teddy-mountained spare room (except for Thursdays) and Bee's sofa had been spent getting a hotel room for a few nights when he could afford it to store up content and then releasing it slowly to his subscribers for deposits into his separate, untouchable high-yield savings account he’d set up solely for the sex work to account for his thousands in losses from Luc.

Some subscribers didn't demand anything at all, they ate up the content he provided on a rationed timeline and gave him good ratings and paid without complaint. Some of them wanted more content, more specific things. And if he didn't provide, then they would bugger off and take their money with them. He had gained and lost a lot of viewers trying to figure things out in the beginning. 

Toys and other people interacting with him were the most requested, and the clients offered more money for such videos. He hadn't met anyone to do videos with as of yet. Plenty had offered, between other performers and horny, hopeful viewers, but Crowley wasn't the type to bend over for just anyone. He wanted someone discreet and gentle. Live chats brought in the most money, but he could only do so many at a time with such little privacy in someone else's sitting room. And he hated putting his face in them. The videos he could crop, could be anonymous, but live chats demanded more interaction by their very nature. Depending on what the caller wanted he would dress up, wear a wig or makeup to distort his face a bit. Anything to preserve a semblance of anonymity. 

He’d been trawling through online for- let postings on Tracy's hideously overstuffed, skirted sofa when he stumbled upon the facade of a familiar building he knew he'd passed innumerable times in Soho. It was an antiquities shop, but he'd never been inside, and there were rooms above it for let. The price was suspiciously good, which meant either a weird roommate or terrible amenities. He had to wonder if he’d even have his own separate room in a flat, or if the posting was far too good to be true. 

Because things usually _were_ , in his experience. 

Crowley saved the posting and called the next day and set up an appointment to meet the landlord and see the rooms. Apparently there would be a small interview first, as a matter of getting to know one another. The fussy man on the other end of the line sounded weary and guarded. He explained that he had priceless products in the shop and needed to know who he was letting inside with a key. It was understandable, but Crowley still felt despair in his stomach at the thought of not passing this man’s test. 

He’d already been turned away by four prospective landlords this week and a dozen more before that through the months since he'd been kicked out. They didn’t want to deal in cash, or demanded proof of income, which he could only provide partial proof of (with Onlyfans and the research papers being dealt under the table). They saw his meager legally-taxed income and sent him packing. 

So yeah, Zira had agreed to take him in and had given him a parking spot and keys and space and Crowley was over the moon. Arse over tits, head over heels. He could also tell that he was developing a crush on the attractive, endlessly fussy and prim other man, but he shook off the feeling. Zira was _undeniably_ gay, but he seemed independent and slightly aloof in that way that said he didn’t _need_ company or a partner and wasn’t necessarily looking for companionship. And that was fine; dating your landlord could hardly go well, in the end. 

Just look what had happened with Luc; moved in with the rich arsehole when they had just started dating, and he ended up homeless and with a sizable chunk of his retirement gone within eighteen months. 

So Crowley kept unpacking and got his rooms ready. One was set up for sleeping, with his laptop charging to the side of the li-lo and sheets and a pillow and his inherited fluffy bedding from Tracy put on it and everything. He left his clothes in the organized boxes for now, resolving to get a dresser and hangers for the closet with his next income. Since rent was paid for the month, he was good to spend the next bit on settling into the space some more; getting a bed and some cheap furniture would be foremost. He had, after all, just signed for twelve months’ time. He could make this place a home, even if only for a year. 

He needed a second monitor and a desk for work, but he'd make do for now with what he had. He could reach out to HR for moving aid if needed but he preferred to keep his head down, do his work, and log off quietly each day.

The other, smaller, oddly-shaped room was set up with his spare lilo and a ring light for the camera and the chest of toys and costumes he had collected over the last few months to use in his premium videos and the live chats. He lined up the cleaning solution, box of wipes, and pump bottle of lube on the floor beside the lilo and inflated the thing and spread fresh sheets on it as well. He shut the door on his way out; no one needed to peek in there, not that anyone but Zira would come calling. Everyone else had seen enough of him lately. 

Bentley was lurking in the bottom of the closet in the bedroom he'd chosen to put his bed and clothes in. She hissed at him when he tried to lure her out, but it was more fearful than menacing. He curled up on the floor in the doorway and scritched her rump. "Come on you bloody great demon. Come see the new digs." She had hated every time he packed her in the carrier and went to live on someone else's sofa, and each move stressed her out. He understood on a visceral level. "We're here for a while, marm. No more moving 'round. You have to be nice to the landlord, though. No pissing in his shoes or stealing his food if he comes by." He scritched her between the ears and left her to mope in the dark with his box of shoes. She'd come around in a day or so, as always. Especially when she realized no one else was going to bother them here.

Crowley whipped out his mobile and searched for pizza reviews in the area and then decided to ask the locals for help after a few minutes' debate over stone- fired or Domino's. 

He went to the door, grabbed his new keys, and trotted downstairs to find Zira. 


	2. Getting to know you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley and Zira get on, talk a little backstory, and go home to masturbate over one another like teenagers.  
> Will they ever learn to communicate?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is like 70% masturbation with a bit of plot furthering. You have thus been forewarned.  
> A little more info on how Croelry's online sex working works and a little sprinkle of pining.  
> Next chapter starts lockdown, if you're paying attention to the dates.

**Later on Moving-In Day, November 2020:**

Crowley and Zira walk elbow-to-elbow conspiratorially toward what the latter says is the best pizzeria in walking distance. They chat amiably, through nothing more serious or nefarious than the abysmal weather, and decide to get a table inside, out of the mounting winter weather and the drizzle that has turned into sleet with the sun going down. Even outdoor heaters won't do much against the cold front ploughing it's way through London. 

"Thank you, Gregory," Zira says with a bright smile at the waiter who has sat them and handed over a single menu. "I am partial to their traditional Margherita, but what would you like, my dear?" 

"Anything's fine. 'M not too picky." Crowley wriggles in his seat until one long leg is propped on the other and settles. The waiter brings tap water, pours two glasses of the house red, takes their order, and retreats. "So. How'd you end up with a 200- year- old, three-story building in Soho and only little old me to let to?" 

"Oh," Zira turns a bit pink and dithers with his napkin. "Well. My great-great-... oh, bugger. _Six-times-back_ grandfather bought the building from new in 1799 and established a bookshop in the bottom that opened in 1800. His name is the one inscribed above the door, and I am named after him. A great-great-uncle turned it into a series of bedsits during the Great War, not wanting to sell it or manage the shop, and then it fell into disuse for a bit before my mother inherited it. I helped her clean it up somewhat and try to re-establish the book business when I was young, but my father wanted nothing to do with it, so when my ever-coming siblings became too much to handle she hired someone to run it so she could raise them, and _he,_ ah, Mr Wood, that is, taught me most of the refurbishing business. He requested a change of course for the shop and then when my mother agreed, we moved from _selling_ books to _repairing_ them, and together we collected some rather rare editions. I sell them occasionally to help with bills when I need to, and find others to save for later times. He passed when I was twenty-seven, and my mother gifted me the deed to the building a few months later. I moved in upstairs and put the storage in the attic and safes and washing tubs and drying racks and the clothes washer in the basement, and I use the shop's natural light to do my repairs. And I let out the two-bedroom flat," here he gestures at Crowley with a nod, "for added income to pay the utilities. There is no mortgage or lien on the place, you understand. But taxes for its location and electric can run high at times, seeing as I needed aircon installed to climate-control the storage." 

"Wow. That's mighty impressive, Zira. S'wot's the A stand for?" 

"Oh no. I don't know you quite enough for that level of mortification yet," Zira chuckles. It earns him a cheeky grin in return and he relaxes into the banter. "And what about yourself?" 

"Oh, nothing so grand. Grew up in Cranley Gardens before it was hip, had extremely working class parents who split when I was five. Went to school, was a twat, rebelled a bit. Came out to my mum when I was thirteen and she cried for months. Didn't kick me out, though. Not til I snuck a boy from down the road in through my bedroom window and she caught us snogging in our pants. So yeah I dunno, I was maybe… sixteen? Somewhere 'round there. I got a job and found a flatmate and we scrounged and starved but we had a grotty little place and then I got a real job through the Civil Service agency. 'S just data entry," he rolls his eyes and takes a sip of wine. Zira listens intently. 

"So then I slept around a lot, fancied myself too hot to be kept, developed some very palpable anxiety and a nice sprinkling of depression and God knows what else… and then I met _Luc_ , and we dated off and on, nothing serious, I was still mainly into slagging round and drinking and couldn't be arsed to go steady when I thought I already had everything. But he convinced me that, after years of dancing round it, what I wanted was someone to make a home with and settle in, prepare for retirement with a loving partner. And so I moved in, and it was bloody _awful_. Nearly six years of arguing and fighting and never having enough or _being_ _enough_ for one another except for the money and convenience of a relationship… being too scared or too stupid to just let go." 

Crowley twirls the paper wrapper from his flatware against the tablecloth and frowns. "He emptied one of my savings accounts slowly over the last year, from what the bank statements tell me, and kicked me out on my arse a few months ago. So now I do what I have to on the side for a little extra income to replenish all that loss, and now I, a bitter old queen, have a place of my own for the _very_ _first time in my life_ , and I have you and your six-times-removed grandpa and an eccentric uncle to thank for that," he grins at Zira then, and it's electric. 

He _means_ it, these wild things he's saying, the gratefulness. He's such an optimist at heart. 

Zira smiles back with a small chuckle, every bit as attracted as he was earlier today in his fugue state when he let the place to a man he'd known for all of twenty minutes. 

___

An hour or so later, pleasantly full of good food and better conversation and gently buzzed off a shared bottle of red, they dash back to the shop, hunched in their coats against the driving sleet which is turning now into more of a problem than either of them initially prepared for. The roads and walkways are slick and the door sticks when Zira goes to unlock it. He jiggles it a bit and the ice gives, and he ushers a shivering Crowley inside. The poor dear slips on the top step on a patch of black ice and nearly goes down, but Zira catches him round the upper arm before he can break his knee on the door jamb. He shoves Crowley indoors first and steps widely over the top step to hurry in after him. 

"Good _lord_ , it got cold and nasty fast! I might let the pipes drip tonight, lest they freeze." Zira murmurs mostly to himself and goes into the back room of the shop to do just that. 

Crowley follows, mouthing _lest_ with a cooked eyebrow and a dimple showing in amusement. He's several paces behind and has his fingers pocketed, looking around the shop fully, now that he's less anxious and more settled. There is an ornate wood and leather chesterfield and a hideous wing back chair tucked in an alcove behind the register, and several shelves and pedestal tables of old books. The place smells dusty but not unlived-in. He hears some squeaky taps go and Zira emerges from what he presumes to be a small water closet. 

"Ah, eyeing up the place already, are we?" Zira smiles playfullly at him, also looking about with a twinkle in his eye. Crowley smiles back, an easy thing across his face. 

"'S a nice place."

"Yes, well. I don't like customers coming in off the streets, you see, so I try to make it just a _bit_ uninviting. The "Only By Appointment" sign helps," he gestures to a handwritten sign in one pane of glass on the front door. "They tend to come in looking for modern, leisure- reading books like I'm a- a… _Waterstone's_ or something." Crowley can't help but snort at how derisively Zira says the name. 

"How very dare they?" He chimes in, coming round to snoop a bit closer at the low shelf between them stuffed with ragged and repaired copies of various Wilde and Elliot novels. His fingers are still jammed in his too-tiny pockets, but he'd rather be uncomfortable and losing circulation than touch Zira's expensive wares amd risk getting fussed at. 

"Would you care for a drink? An aperitif, or I have some rather decent wine. I believe you mentioned it being a vice," Zira says, waving Crowley over to the chesterfield as he fiddles on a liquor trolley and brings over two glasses of something dark. Crowley drops onto the old buttery leather with a sigh and accepts his glass. He checks his watch while mulling over a sip in his mouth and frowns, contemplating. 

"Oh, I am sorry dear, do you have some work to be doing? I should let you go, of course…" Zira frets. 

"Nah, no. No way, angel." _Jesus did that just fall out of his mouth? What even is playing coy, fuck._ "I can do as I like in the evening hours, remember? I can have the night off if I want, and I _do_. At the very least I'm exhausted, but we're having a nice time, I think." 

"Oh," Zira says with a small smile. He wriggles happily into his worn wing back chair and sighs. "To nights off, and new beginnings." He raises his glass and Crowley clicks them together with a gentle grin. 

He doesn't remember the last time he smiled this much in one afternoon. 

So it's like that: easy from the onset. Hours later, after bantering and finishing at least another bottle of red and more talking and even more giggling, they decide it is time for bed. Zira checks the locks and follows Crowley up the narrow stairs, and they part with a silly grin and wave each on the landing. 

"G'night, angel." 

"Good night, Crowley." 

Their doors close, lock, and each begins the ritual of settling in for the night. 

___

Crowley shakes a scoop of dry cat food until Bentley sticks her head out of the bedroom door. Aside from street noise, the apartment has been perfectly quiet all afternoon; surely she has settled more by now. Enough to eat anyway. He sets the bowl down and she comes trotting over. 

"Need a sofa, don't I?" He sways listlessly downward to twine her tail between his fingers and stares into the empty void of what will eventually be a sitting room and shakes his head. He gets a _mrrp_ for his troubles and heaves a sigh. Time to go web surfing for cheap secondhand options; a bed _must_ come first. He isnt young enough to handle floors anymore, and an inflatable li-lo is hardly better on the back and hips. 

He uses the toilet and sets up Bentley's litter box beside the little shell-shaped pedestal sink and washes his hands and face after the long day he's had. London grit and sweat wash away, leaving him feeling a bit refreshed. As much as he can do without a full shower, anyway. 

_Could do with a wank_ , he thinks absently as he stares at his reflection in the mirror. _Not too bad.. wonder what_ he _sees?_ He pushes the thoughts away, of the man across the hall and his ridiculously croquettes eyes. Crowley tips his chin this way and that, scrutinizing the tiny sprouts of beardstart and wondering for the millionth time if he should just let it grow. _Beards are fashionable nowadays. Could go native_. 

The question is- about the wanking, anyway: _should he film it for archive footage_? 

Ultimately he decides yes, he'd rather like sinking down slow on something substantial and coming hard enough to fall asleep right after, and it's hardly more work to just film it if he's doing it anyway, so he goes into the spare room to prep. He rarely does the whole nuisance of properly filming while tipsy, but he always heavily edits before posting, so it can hardly be a bad idea. 'S not like he'll accidentally post anything. 

Crowley sets up the lighting ring, pulls out his favorite dildo and a condom, and pushes the lube closer to the inflated mattress. His laptop is in the bedroom, so he fetches it and begins setting it up. His cock is already stirring at the familiar routine, showing keen interest. 

He pulls a bobble off his wrist and ties his hair up tight on top of his head to hide it, keeping it and his face out of the shot as he lines up the camera. He strips to his y-fronts and sprawls on his belly on the li-lo, one hand pressed beneath him and already dipping under the waistband to tease at himself while the other fiddles with the laptop, zooming and changing angles as needed. 

As Crowley lines up the shot and zooms in a touch more, he finds himself fully hard and already wet at the tip. He's a little surprised between being in his mid-forties and slightly drunk, but he has had a rather stressful (and then rather delightful) day. And this is _his_ place, he doesn't have to feel rushed while someone is out doing the shopping. Or have to pack up and leave in the morning, and he doesn't have to clean his come, shame-faced, off the bedding to hide it from hotel staff or from Bee or Tracy. He can and _will_ wash his own shit _when he wants to_ , and that is that. 

The thought is enough to paralyze him for a moment. Crowley has _never_ had his own place, by himself, with no expectation to keep up a certain standard of cleanliness that is wholly his own. He can spread out here, make room, and do-- _actually do_ what he likes. 

It's _intoxicating_. The freedom seems boundless. Images of lush mid-century modern decor and velvet and leather and metal furniture and loads of plants and his snake's terrarium in that one wide front-facing window fill his mind's eye, and he feels his cock deflating a bit at being ignored. 

Reinvigorated, he wraps a hand around himself to fluff up a bit and hits _record_. He's kneeling in front of the screen now, only seen from navel to knees, cock hanging heavy in between lean, golden-pale thighs and balls drawn up behind it. His groin hair is tastefully trimmed; still lightly furred so it doesn't demarcate starkly from his leg hair, but kept in check routinely with clippers. The favored toy, a textured, animalistic "dragon" dildo covered in ridges and with a widely mushroomed head and nice curve, is chunky and heavy but good for riding. There is a fist-sized knot at the base he can take if he preps enough, and he does so for the more discerning subscriber. Tonight though, he just wants to come. 

Crowley has long since learnt that he has a nice cock and smallish, tight bollocks. Even if it weren't for the compliments from his subscribers and past lovers, it would be obvious on the screen that his bits and bobs are _pretty_ . He uses the angles of the camera to his advantage, well past the point of amateurish shots and poorly-lit angles that left half of what he was doing to question. Subscribers pay better for seeing _more_ , and he knows now how to grant them what they want. His premium videos and live chats have the best lighting and the most variation. 

He gets a palmful of lube and smooths it down his cock, tugging at the length of it lightly until his hips jolt up in response. He cups his bollocks gently and lets two fingers drift further back, painting over his hole. The toy he chose tonight is long and thick enough that it can stand on its own, so that he can sit on his knees and sink down on it, but it is not his thickest or even his most interesting, despite the mad, fantasy-genre-look of it. _Those_ toys require extra prep time, which he is far too tired for now. For this toy, he is old hands enough at it that a few fingers, maybe five minutes spent rocking down on them, and he is ready to take this most popular one. He knows that fingering himself wastes time (and therefore makes a longer video) and also excites his random drop-in customers, who might buy another video after this or hit subscribe. 

The dildo is balanced on its wide base on the floor at the end of the li-lo, his ankles hanging off and bookending it with and knees on the bed. His back is to the laptop and ring light. The angle is adjusted on the camera so his head is out of the frame, and down he sits. 

It's an incredible breach and he stutters out a soft moan on the way down until his stretched rim hits the top of the knot. The dildo is just thick enough to rub its textured ridges firmly along his prostate at this angle as he wiggles side to side, getting acclimated to the stretch. 

He bears down, kneels up, takes a breath, and drops his weight quickly back down. The punch of it pushes a sound out of his chest that he chokes off with a _hnng_. He reaches one hand forward to circle his cock and another behind to grip one lean arse cheek to hold himself open for the view. The blow to his senses from slamming down on the toy is momentarily overwhelming but he breathes, adjusts his angle, and tries again. 

After that, it is a quick, rough ride to a powerful finish, grinding the ridge of the toy's flared cockhead against his prostate in deep, smooth thrusts until he comes, splattering into his palm. He pauses a moment, breath heaving, to come down from the high and then rises off the toy with a pop, still holding open one cheek to let the camera see the slight gape it gives his hole as the muscle winks slowly shut. 

He heaves a sigh and sits back on his ankles, feeling boneless and exhausted. The alcohol has burned out of him by now, replaced with the easy wave of dopamine from a strong orgasm. He clicks off the camera, saves the file to his editing folder for later, and takes his toys and sticky hands to the loo for a wash. 

It's nearly midnight, but he showers anyway, letting the hot water sluice away the slight burn between his cheeks and the sickness of lube and come mingling there. He's going to sleep so hard after this. 

Crowley makes it to his bed by miracle alone, stumbling and blissfully naked, his pink-warmed skin prickling in the cold air of the flat. He cranks up the baleen-like radiator in his room and curls under the only blanket he has and falls asleep almost immediately. 

_____

January 2020

Zira is making tea in the downstairs alcove in the shop. The old kettle is boiling noisily as he plops a tea bag into his favorite angel-wing mug, (which Crowley had gotten him- paired with an adorably shy smirk and matching his-and-his blankets for the sofa - for Christmas last month). He smiles fondly at the memory and pours the water in, taking the cuppa to his workstation and setting it carefully away from the loose papers he is cleaning for one of Gabriel's clients. 

He is just dusting powder over the last page, an hour or so later (tea partially forgotten and long-since cold), when he hears the telling squeaks and creaks that the old building sighs, telling him that his housemate is awake and moving about. Zira glances aboce the rims of his tiny focal lenses at his mantle clock and smirks. 

It's nearly nine in the morning, which is when Crowley usually rolls out of bed to log on and do his "real work" as he calls it. The data entry job may pay the bulk of his bills, but Crowley seems bored out of his mind with it. Zira is still unclear what the side jobs _are_ , but he knows that his rent comes from the data entry job and that the rest is under- the- table and goes toward savings from what Crowley's ex stole from him, so Zira doesn't see how it oughr to matter to him at all. 

Crowley has thus far, in nearly three months, been a gold- star tenant. He upgraded the internet and gave Zira the passwords to several "streaming services" by which the latter understands he can watch telly at a whim. He also plans and curates a weekly "wine and whinge" night with the most delicious charcuterie spreads and drink choices for just the two of them to sit on the same sofa and rant or just talk and giggle like idiots in a safe space and _relax_. They fall asleep on the sofas most times, hence the Christmas blankets. 

Crowley had gotten a proper bed a few weeks into living here, and a sofa that folds out to a springy bed just afterward, which he got from some person he met online. It had been murder to move up the narrow stairs and into a right-angle doorway, but they had prevailed. 

Bentley the cat likes Zira tremendously and curls onto his lap at every opportunity, which Crowley says is just her being a slag and wanting his prosciutto. 

The only complaint he has, and it's not much of one, is that the _bloody_ snake is terrifying to stumble upon when he's not expecting it. It isn't a fair accusation: the thing is never out of Crowley's rooms and doesn't move particularly fast, but it's still a fright on occasion. Crowley had asked him _so cautiously_ if he might go back for it and risk a proper fight with Luc about the beast, and Zira had been helpless to say no, seeing as how much Crowley must love the blasted thing if he was willing to start an argument with his cruel ex just to get it back. 

So Crowley had come home with a massive glass terrarium and a spotted "panda" piebald ball python looped around his shoulders under a scarf to keep warm. Zira had startled at the sight of a snow white snout and flickering tongue edging out of the red and black tartan scarf (which had been his gift to the other man, much to Crowley’s teeth-sucking and scoffing, but he wears it every time he goes out, anyway), but Ash is so little a nuisance it hardly registers on Zira's radar. It's like the cat; until Zira is in Crowley's living space it isn't something he thinks about being there. 

Which is why he (or she- Crowley says he isn't certain on the sex) scares the daylights out of Zira when he's on the floor in a sun spot and moves suddenly to avoid being trod on. 

But then there's the _plants_. Oh, Zira could wax poetic about the verdant jungle Crowley has nursed into life in his sitting room. The sofa and a side table are surrounded by potted plants of all leaf shapes and sizes, and sitting on the sofa feels like sinking into a small, private wilderness. He has, once or twice, heard Crowley fussing at something which turned out to be him shaking a water mister and berating a monstera over a brown spot, but whatever he does clearly works. The plants do not disappoint in their beauty. 

The door upstairs opens and the stairs creak and Crowley slowly appears, looking mussed and sleepy but as beautiful as ever. Zira shakes his head at himself and wills the thought away. The other man stops halfway down the stairs and pokes his head around the half-wall to squint toward Zira's work table. He sees that they are alone and comes the rest of the way down, yawning hugely.

"Angel? Lunch, later? Sushi sounds good t'me. Or some curry. Wanting rice, I think," Crowley says, scratching his belly with his threadbare tee-shirt rucked up. He is barefoot and in his pyjama bottoms still, with a blanket wrapped over his shoulders. Zira smiles and tries not to stare too hard at the line of auburn hair disappearing into his friend's waistband. 

"Lunch would be lovely, my dear. Let me know if you're wanting to go out or order in delivery." 

“Hmm. My shout this time, you did that Italian Monday night. I’ll come prod at ya ‘round noon, then.” and with another jaw-unhinged yawn, Crowley retreats back up the stairs. ZIra listens to his door shut and exhales the breath he’d been holding in. 

Living with the object of his deepest affection in _years_ is becoming more and more of a thorn in his foot. Zira _tries_ not to let his gaze linger, or smile too much at Crowley’s jokes, or be too touched by his caring and generous nature, but he _just can’t help it_! Crowley seems to be a perfect match for everything Zira has ever fantasized about in an ideal partner. He’s witty, independent, gorgeous, doting, funny, and kind. He thinks about Zira’s desires and makes them happen, and seems genuinely pleased to see that his efforts are appreciated. 

However, no _move_ has been made, as it were, on either side. Zira, as landlord, is terrified to cross that line and be stuck with someone for nearly ten more months who doesn’t reciprocate those feelings. Crowley hasn’t explicitly said he is interested, but his actions tend to speak for him in a lot of ways. It's hard to parse out what might be _flirting_ and what might just be Crowley's _personality_ in every little thoughtful act he makes. His face is so expressive that sometimes Zira is convinced it’s the only reason he wears his dark glasses so much. Just yesterday he went out for a cat tree after paying rent and came home with a box of pastries from Zira’s favorite patisserie clear across the Central Line at King's Cross. Crowley had left them on the desk by the till with a wink and a flash of dimple in his cheek and went back up to his flat to build the carpet-covered monstrosity for Bentley. 

When Zira had gone up later that night to retire for the evening, Crowley’s door was shut and there was no noise from within, the line under the door darkened, indicating he was either working on one of his “side jobs'' or already sleeping, despite it being only half seven. Zira had dipped his chin a bit sadly and gone into his own sitting room to have a glass of wine and read until he was sleepy. 

_____________

Crowley was living out his own personal nightmare. 

He had made _such strides_ since moving in with Zira. His data entry job was going well; he’d gotten a small promotion and now spent most of his days training new workers instead of doing the mind-numbing chore of completing digital files for eight hours a day. In the evenings he usually spent time shopping for his flat, cleaning, cooking, watching telly, or hanging out with Zira either downstairs on the ancient chesterfield or in one of their flats with a bottle going back and forth between them. The latter was his favorite because of the absolute fact that he was _desperately in love_ with the blonde. 

Zira was irrationally fussy, driven, staid in his ways, and liked to complain. He loved good food and better drink and was happiest being left alone with a good book. If Crowley was quiet and played on his phone or napped while Zira read, they could sit together in amiable, pleased silence for hours. He loved being able to just _coexist_ with another person and not have a row about the most infinitesimal things every hour. 

Zira had even taken to Ash with enough decorum that Crowley had very nearly swooned on the spot. He had even held out his hands and asked if he could hold them as Crowley had set up the terrarium. Watching his landlord-cum-best friend stroke his beloved snake on his shitty secondhand couch in his sitting room was very nearly enough to do his poor old soppy heart in. 

The _problem_ was that he was terrified to cross that unspoken line between them. He was stricken with anxiety at the very _idea_ of shooting his shot and Zira scrunching his cute little nose up in distaste, and then he'd have to live here and pay the man rent for the next ten months knowing that they were at best _friendly_ but would never be anything more. 

But Crowley wanted so badly to be _more_. To go have dinner together, holding hands while walking back, and to come home and crawl onto Zira on the sofa for a snog and maybe take him to bed. To sleep next to that soft body, curled against the lush curves of him. Crowley liked being held and touched, and he desperately wanted that from his new friend, but the idea of what he could lose if he messed it up was too much to bear. 

So he kept his distance and was careful to not bother Zira every single night, no matter how much he wanted to. He forced himself to make more sexy videos and take on more chats, eager to distract himself with anything at hand. He spent some nights wanking himself into a raw oblivion, others sprawled across his sofa in a languid fugue state of self-imposed isolation and Golden Girls. 

The newest moneymaker in his ever-expanding collection of toys and outfits had been a small but powerful fucking machine. He had played with it by himself for a few trial runs and then made some short videos to see how they would be received. He found an attachable toy that was _deliciously_ thick and had a heavy counterweight in the balls that slapped his perineum just right when he set the machine to a pounding pace. He came explosively every time he used the machine, and the money he had spent had been earned back in _two days_ once it had been uploaded to his page. 

It became a new distraction, having a lovely day with Zira after the workday was over, or on a weekend, and then spending the night alone, sometimes with a camera or a caller for company, pretending the fucking machine was the blonde pounding into him from behind or stroking his cock as he laid back in the pile of pillows with a prostate massager in, or Zira's mouth instead of a warmed fleshlight around his cock, sucking him off sweetly. It was too easy to imagine the filthy words that well-read mind could whisper into his ear, weight bearing down on him as he crooned praises Crowley for being pretty, for being so hard, his tight hole, his hot, wet mouth. 

The fantasies only grew, and in the beginning Crowley told himself that they would ease the ache he felt for some physical affection. He knew he was lying to himself, that affection and desire didn’t work that way. He had never been good at listening to himself, however. 

Tonight he had four hours blocked for live chats and so far he was booked up and had people waitlisted in case of no-shows. Zira had been placated with a light, early dinner when Crowley said he had to work, and had just left a few moments ago. 

Crowley cleaned up after their dinner and went to shower and treat himself to the _particular_ torments of a full enema cleanse since he had such a long night ahead of him. He had installed a special hose and attachment on the shower head that took the place of a bagged enema or his usual douche bulb, and it was much less telling to have it hanging in the shower than an enema bag and hose laying about if Zira happened to see it. Not that he ever let ZIra inside the flat without knowing everything was tucked well away, even in the spare room. 

He turned the water in the shower hot enough, pressed the hose nozzle just inside his arse with a bit of lube and filled himself and then pressed a plug in to help trap it, and commenced with his shower. The stretching ache of liquid fullness started to cramp in his gut after a few moments, but he persisted until he was suitably clean, exfoliated, and trimmed everywhere he wanted to be. He got out, leaving the water running, and sat on the toilet to remove the plug. Once emptied, he climbed back in and washed his lower half thoroughly, replaced the plug in his arse (he'd appreciate it later while on camera, he knew from experience) and shut the water off. 

Clambering out a final time, Crowley checked his reflection in the mirror and stared at the auburn scruff he'd begun to let grow. He needed to see if any _characters_ would be required tonight that might make him need to shave. Wrapped in a towel, he went to check his laptop for the list of bookings he had tonight. 

The first one was a weekly regular. He was brusque and short and rotund, and he liked Crowley to use a large plug or dildo in his arse, or to suck on something while he pretended it was the man's cock. He liked POV vantage points and he didn't usually care if Crowley came, so he was a good first booking to have in case he didn't. He always tipped and he always logged off as soon as he came. 

The next was a couple he had seen a few times now. They liked to fuck one another and have Crowley act as a voyeur, jerking himself off with intermittent noises of affirmation. They wanted to see his come, every time. They usually wanted him to lick it off his fingers. If he came when _they_ did, they tipped better. 

Third tonight was a young lady, another regular. She liked to watch him stuff things in his arse or use his fucking machine; the thicker or more extreme toy, the better. He usually worked himself until he could take the knot on his favorite toy, or his fist. She used a vibrator and had more than once asked if he would be willing to put a cock cage on himself while he fucked his arse for her. She wanted to know if he could come hands-free or not, and he had tried several times for her to no avail. It would take ages of prostate stimulation to achieve that end early in the night, and frankly she didn’t pay enough for him to put in that sort of effort. He hadn't tried the cock cage yet, but last time he had flirtatiously implied he would get a cage and try it. 

(He hadn't yet. The idea of not being able to touch himself or get hard worried him, but it was also a bit exciting. He had to admit the imagery would be delicious onscreen.)

The last was another regular, an American, macho-man, Ken- doll type who kept his face neatly out of the camera. He had a huge build, tall and fit and heavily muscled, but he also obviously waxed his body hair, which was amusing to Crowley who _didn't_ and _liked_ body hair. The client clearly liked being in control and preferred Crowley in drag, or at least in lingerie. He usually put on a wig and makeup to play to this guy's desires, and he tipped _very_ well if Crowley did an expert job at looking as andro-leaning or femme as possible while without tits and while having a cock. That being said, he _clearly_ knew his way around a cock and balls and asked for everything under the sun in unpredictable ways. Toys, fucking his fist, sucking on things, deep-throating with eye contact, taking things deeply into arse until his belly protruded, edging, self-shibari… Crowley had actually learned _a lot_ from having this guy on. "A_fckng_GM" was his best paying client, and he made Crowley _work_ for it every week. He was best for last because he dragged out every session until Crowley came, even if it was a wrung-out, exhausted dribble. He seemed to delight in knowing he was last every time, and that Crowley was boneless and spent by the end of their appointment. He had recently paid Crowley six hundred pounds and _then_ a tip to tie himself up with his hands behind his back and let the fucking machine pound into him until it milked him dry. He was hoarse and hadn’t been able to sit at his computer for work the next day, and he’d released cached videos on his site for a few days afterward as well, but that deposit hitting his account had been worth it, in the end. 

Depending on how late it ran and how exhausted he was after the last guy, he might open up more time for drop-ins. He didn't do it often, but it helped build his customer base. He always wore a mask or angled his head out of the shot if he did these, since they were open to the public. Even going on six months into this job, he was trying to save some anonymity. 

So Crowley went back to the loo and shaved and got a water bottle and a damp flannel and made his way back to the spare room, where he got set up for the night and booted up the laptop to get the camera prepped and turned the ring light on. He set a bin to one side to catch soiled toys in between calls and set up a cleaning station off screen for hands and thighs and leaks and anything else. After all that, he went and fed the cat and did his makeup and wrapped his hair under a wig cap. He put on a wig that was long and chestnut brown and slipped in dark contacts and wrapped himself in his favorite burgundy silk midthigh housecoat. He barely looked like himself. 

_Good_. 

Crowley nodded at his reflection and moved back to the sex room and rummaged in his chest for a suitable outfit to set aside for the Ken Doll bloke later. He pulled out a strappy black bralette and garter set with little red bows that had crotchless knickers to pair and set it out. 

If he played his cards right and no one cancelled, he stood to earn over a thousand pounds tonight after tips, depending on how Ken Doll acted and paid. A hundred per chat and he knew the first and last booked would tip the max 200, plus anything else the others gave. He just had to play the game for the next few hours and take hydration and snack breaks between to recoup. 

Crowley shook himself, got into character, watched the clock, and hit Enter Room at 8pm sharp. 

_________

Across the landing, Zira was in his sitting room in the wingback chair with a book. He had a mug of fresh cocoa at his elbow and his little glasses on his nose and the old gramophone was scratching out a nice, soothing tune for a cold evening in. 

He had been reading the paper earlier, but the news about Australia burning and some novel virus in China boiling over had left a bad taste in his mouth. He had thrown the paper out and went for something to lose himself in; a nice Forster, perhaps? He himself is certainly pining, anyway. It might soothe the soul to read about poor Maurice and Scudder hiding their love. He loves the book and chooses to read it again. 

By the time Alec is climbing the trellis to enter Maurice’s room, Zira is hard in his pants and biting his lip. He wants so badly to go knock on Crowley’s door and hand him this book, ask him tomorrow if it was meaningful to him at all. If the story sounded familiar, or perhaps baldly ask if Crowley has any interest in him at all. 

He doesn’t. He knows Crowley is working and probably won't have time to read it for a while. He’s also sure he won’t survive the response if it’s anything aside from a resounding yes and a thorough snog in the doorway. 

_Oh dear_ , he’s daydreaming again. _Better get a lid on it._

He goes back to his book and is almost immediately distracted again at the visual of the two men spending the night curled together in Maurice’s single bed, nude and sated. His cock gives another insistent throb and pushes outward and up. Zira decides he had better do something about it before it starts aching like it has been for _months_. 

Nearly since that fateful November day, in fact. 

Zira huffs at himself and stands, finishing his cocoa in one draught that scalds his throat a bit. He coughs against the burn and puts the cup in the sink and goes to his bedroom, turning off the gramophone as he passes it. Once closed in his bedroom, he strips and folds his clothes carefully, setting the waistcoat and bowtie over the back of his slipper chair and putting the rest in his laundry bag for laundry day later in the week. He shrugs into a camel-coloured dressing gown of good weight and crawls into bed. 

Teasing himself has always been a preferred method, with edging being a personal favorite some days when he is desperate for interaction and there is none to be had. Zira is not prone to pulling men, and has never much enjoyed going out looking for “tail” as they say. He goes on dates (though it has been a long time) and occasionally watches pornography when his own imagination is lagging, and otherwise handles himself as needed. 

Crowley, however, has made his usual foray into masturbation more of a daily occurrence than his old-normality of weekly indulgences. The man is just _so bloody attractive_ and _perfect_ and _desirable_ in every way, and Zira is so utterly smitten. Naturally his body is taking that one-sided interest entirely the wrong way and he is having to handle intense arousal nearly every night that he spends with Crowley, be it dinner or lounging in the sitting room with wine, but most especially after “wine and whinge” night, where Crowely is so comfortable he melts into the sofa and talks like they’ve known each other for millennia instead of only three months. It makes Zira feel _important_ , knowing that Crowley lets his guard down with him that much, and that feeds directly back into his arousal. It is typical anymore that as soon as he's alone in his rooms he has to see to a burgeoning erection within the hour.

Just now, Zira’s cock is insistently jutting out of his boxers, so he pushes them down his thighs and takes himself in hand. He has a fat cock, built stodgy like the rest of him, and his fingers do not fit all the way round. He squeezes himself at the base and hisses at the sensation, wondering vaguely how Crowley likes to be touched, or if he would ask Zira how _he_ would want him to do it. If his long, narrow fingers would be able to meet around the girth of Zira’s cock. If he would be eager to use his witty, sarcastic mouth, to stretch it thin around his cockhead and lick over the glans. Zira knows he would be good at it, the little minx. 

Sinking into the thought like a warm bath, Zira shimmies down the bed and into the pillows and tugs at himself again. Soon, he reaches over for lubricant and smears it over himself, his hand tightening at the sensation and hips bucking up to meet his fist. It won’t take long; thinking of Crowley always makes him spill over his fist in mere minutes. 

Zira bites his bottom lip hard and thinks of Crowely’s mouth on his, of those long, lean thighs straddling his waist as they frot on the sofa between all his beautiful plants. Their cocks would be gripped together in a fist, Crowely’s hips moving for them in that unhinged way they always seem to work. Would he make noises? Would he want to talk dirty? Zira knew from their interactions thus far that Crowley had a bit of a praise kink about him and flustered when he was properly thanked for things, or told his actions were worthy of praise or that they were _good_. Zira had to imagine that with that came an abundance of desire to be told he was beautiful and doing very well in bed; lots of praise for a man who deserved nothing less. Would he sink his teeth into Zira's shoulder as he came, shuddering out his release there on Zira's lap, breathing hard and sweating? 

He came over his fist thinking of his lips at Crowley’s throat, nibbling there as the other man rutted them to completion against his belly, their come slicking between them as they stuttered to a stop and came to rest together in his mind’s eye.

Zira sighed heavily and let his limbs go limp for a moment,, letting the rush of happy hormones flood his senses.. Now came the self- flagellating part where he cleaned up and tried to pretend he hadn’t just wanked to his closest friend, whom he bloody well _lived with_ , and try to move on tomorrow with this part of himself squashed down deep below. 

He hoped one of them would make their intentions known, and soon. 


	3. Lockdown and Lasting Effects

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lockdown begins with a plea for sanity, Crowley loses his job and has a few meltdown, and Zira learns that he is actually quite good at comforting his friend.

CW= ash eats a frozen/thawed _already dead_ feeder mouse- not detailed. Crowley loses his job and has a few smallish panic attacks/breakdowns about it. 

**24 March, 2020**

"Angel this is _ridiculous_ ," Crowley complained loudly from the landing, standing outside Zira's tightly-shut door with his hands full of shopping bags. "We have been in contact this whole time! And we both work from home! I saw you two days ago, and aside from getting the shopping in today, I've been at home for the last week. And so have you!" 

"I understand your arguments, Crowley, but it's _not allowed_ !" Zira was muffled through the door, clearly standing the requisite two meters from it. "We can't just disobey the NHS' rules because we don't want to _not_ see one another! Now go in your flat so I can go downstairs to get some books so I can settle in for a few days." 

Crowley spluttered, indignant. "Are you _serious_?! We touch the same doors and knobs, entryways, the bloody handrail up the stairs. You can't avoid all that!" 

"I can wipe them down as I go up and down, and wear a face covering in the shop." 

"Oh, you just have an answer for everything, yeah?” Crowley started to pace the small landing and forgot about the bags. They bashed against his knees and he growled anew, irritated. “We share ventilation and plumbing through this wall!!" Crowley was properly shouting now, forgetting himself. "Come _on_ , you can't really expect us to avoid one another for _three weeks_ because of the news, when we live in the same building with doors less than a metre apart and share aircon and cooker ventilation. Your dedication to rules even _within your own home_ is _beyond me_!" 

He was met with silence. Not an angry silence, but a Thinking Silence. It mildly disturbed Crowley to learn that he could tell what Zira's silences meant even behind closed doors. But then again it proved how much time they’d spent together in the last almost-five months, and that made him feel warm all over again. And then cold with anger again that Zira was going to _abandon him_ based on some NHS ruling that mandated separate households quarantining separately. They weren’t separate! Not _really_! He leaned in and nearly put his ear to the wood to listen for the slightest sound of acquiescence. There was nothing forthcoming, so he pushed off the door with a growl. 

"Fine. _Fine_ ! I'm going to make this charcuterie and drink a whole bottle of wine and binge _Kitchen Nightmares_ and pine over Gordon Ramsay and bitch about life _all by myself_ a whole fifteen feet and two doors away and _you_ can sit in there and be alone and breathe our _shared air_ , since you can't be reasoned with!" He turned and stomped into his own flat and shut the door too hard, regretting it immediately. “I’m not even going to _think_ about you while I eat this _whole_ wheel of brie and fresh raspberries and prosciutto. Not to mention the balsamic-soaked mozzarella balls!” Crowley shouted, knowing his voice would carry easily in the cooker ventilation that literally shared the same metal pipe inside the wall. “I even went completely unhinged and got _pain au chocolat_ for afters!” he dropped the bags on the worktop beside the cooker with a deflated huff. 

Either Zira would come around in a day or two, or he wouldn't. But Crowley didn't want to think about the boredom and loneliness that would set in if he _didn't_. 

"I can too be reasoned with," said Zira's irritable voice through the door. Crowley turned and glared at it, as if that would make any difference at all to the idiot stood outside. "I had forgotten about the shared ventilation." 

"Are you going to panic and call the NHS on me if I open the door?" 

There was silence for a beat, which Crowley could visualize as Zira shoring up his reserve of whatever energy he possessed that soaked up Crowley's chaotic nervous energy like a sponge. Or maybe rolling his eyes. "No." 

Crowley opened the door. Zira looked miserable and anxious and Crowley immediately wanted to wrap him in a hug and soothe the frown lines between his eyebrows by pressing his mouth there. 

“You said you had raspberries and balsamic mozzarella?” Zira eyed the countertop curiously and glanced down at Bentley winding around his ankles. He reached down to pet along her back and twirl her tail. “I see someone is relieved I gave in, even if your daddy isn’t.” 

“Oi! I’m the only reason you came ‘round to realize how _silly_ you were being about it. If we were honestly in different flats, or-or… or on separate _floors_ , yeah. Maybe. Not across the threshold like this and sharing the same bloody cooker vent.” Crowley glared at his cat and stepped around them gingerly to start unloading the bags onto his seasoned cutting board. "Last time _you_ actually cooked my main room was flooded with _your_ smoke that came pouring through that sodding thing, so don't tell me it's properly done at all. So I suppose we can thank your great uncle-Whoever for a shite job, else we'd be spending lockdown lonely." Crowley talked as he unpacked and set everything out, vibrating with nervous energy. He needed to have a drink and calm the fuck down, and he did that best with Zira nowadays. He vaguely wondered when he had become so dependent on the other man and pushed the thought away, not wanting to dwell on it. 

He tastefully didn’t remark when Zira pilfered the mozzarella balls until he was handed a bottle of bordeaux and the wine opener. "Make yourself useful, angel. Go turn something on," he handed him two glasses and waved Zira away toward the sofa. 

Crowley followed a moment later with the laden cutting board and set it down and disappeared into his bedroom. Zira watched the darkened sliver of doorway, listening to dresser drawers opening and closing and the soft _fwumps_ of clothes being dropped in a hamper. 

Crowley emerged a moment later in skin-tight black leggings that were buttery soft and luxurious aran wool socks and a worn-soft top in his hand. It was a marked difference from his tight black denims and boots and leather jacket that he was wearing before. Like this, Crowley was soft, unwrapped… probably the most like himself that he allowed others to see. Zira felt honored. The redhead stopped a few feet away and pulled the long sleeved, waffle-weave, grey Henley with oxblood red buttons over his head and came to stand right beside Zira, making a _gimme-gimme_ gesture for the controls. He was close enough that Zira could feel his _body heat_. 

Zira swallowed the crushed raspberry on his tongue and handed the controls over and resigned himself to sitting and behaving himself until he could flee back to his room to hide his burning cheeks. Maybe he could pass his blush off as a side effect of the strong red wine. He closed his eyes against the seared-in image of Crowley's pert little handful of bum and the neat bundle of his cock and bollocks in the tight bottoms. How could he _not_ ? The man rarely wore pants, as Zira had discovered their first shared laundry day. At any rate, he certainly _clearly_ isn't wearing any _right now_ and Zira nearly choked on a fresh (only mildly distracting) mouthful of bordeaux at the realization. 

“Alright angel, any requests?” Crowley wriggled into his usual pour of limbs to Zira’s left, half-curled and half-sprawled between the arm of the sofa and Zira's side where his bony toes were burrowed under a thick thigh. Zira stared down at his delicate ankles and swallowed. He failed to shove away the fantasy that if he were ever lucky enough to get his mouth on Crowley that he would start out by pressing kisses to those fine bones, his hand wrapped all the way around the slim joint, and work his way up, tasting every inch. He did have a bit of an oral fixation, after all. He would bet Crowley tasted like clean sweat and sunshine. Zira caught himself licking his lips and blinked away the daydream. He looked up at his dearest friend with a small smile. 

“No my dear. You'll pick for us.” 

* * *

**May, 2020**

"Ex...excuse me?" Crowley stammered, his blood going cold. He felt nauseous, a sweat breaking out across the back of his neck. "Wot?" He leaned in to his laptop as if that would make the message come across any clearer. 

"We're having to cut back _severely_ right now, Anthony. I'm so sorry, but your position is being downsized and you were one of the last promoted." 

"Can't I go back to data entry? I've been here for _twelve years_!" Crowley was begging, he knew it. It wasn't a good look. 

"They've cut back data entry too, and there's more cuts coming. At this point, anyone's position is in jeopardy. Look, they just bloody well cleared out 70 percent of _HR and finance_ last week, you think they give a shit about _data entry_ right now? You are the _last_ new trainer being cut, and that's only because I _fought_ them about it. You've got more tenure than most, but they're going from most recent positions and not allowing demotions." His direct manager, Chad, rubbed a finger and thumb in his eyes. "Look. It's just a _furlough_ ; if we come back in a month or two you'll be brought back in. We're not even taking back the laptop and whatnot, you can keep them for now." 

"For now," Crowley echoed. He chuckled, indignant. His voice came out hollow. "Wow." 

"I know. I _know_ everyone's _panicking_ and it's all just utter chaos out there, but even the remote people are seen as added weight right now, and they are trying to keep the ship afloat. If I don't get the axe, like, permanently, you'll be one of the first brought back on my team, and I hope you believe me." 

"Right." Crowley bit his lip. He wanted to smash something and felt entirely, helplessly lost. The plants were going to hear about this. 

_But then Zira would overhear it_ , and that created a whole new wave of panic. 

"Anyway, you'll get your last check and severance bonus in a week or two and then we'll be in sort of loose contact til this whole bloody fucking _rot_ blows over. Just stay inside and stay _safe_ , yeah?" 

"Yeah. I… I gotta go." 

"Alright mate. Sorry again. Bye." Chad rung off the video call and Crowley's screen went black. 

_Would you like to rate this call_? Teams asked, unaware of the implications. He laughed a little hysterically and gave it a one star and logged off, feeling both drained and filled with imporent fury. 

Crowley sat there for a few silent, numb minutes at his little new desk, in his new desk chair, both of which are less than two months old. He covered the second rise of the desk in potted plants and a sad, deflated string-of-pearls succulent he’d found by the chip-and-pin machines in Boots which he was nursing back to life. He even had a mug warmer thingy to keep his cuppa hot at his elbow. 

And now it was all useless. 

His other jobs didn't require a desk, or have time for tea breaks. University had been deferred last month, all the students sent packing, which meant The Them and their varied connections didn't need him writing their papers anymore because they could cheat all the livelong day on their tests and essays, now that everything was fully online. So that income was shot. 

All he had left, now that his main income was gone, _furloughed_ , as if that meant anything other than _made redundant_ , was the sex videos. 

_Don't panic. Zira won't kick you out. You can use savings for a bit, you have plenty. These last months' work are paying off now, aye?_

Even his own inner monologue sounded reedy. 

He had to tell Zira. What the fuck was he going to do if the man actually turned him out? 

Crowley took a deep breath and scooted back from the desk, making sure no sleepy tails were behind his wheels with a glance around. Ash was coiled loosely on the lip of a large potted Fiddle Leaf, snoozing in a sunbeam. Bentley was under them, sprawled like a fur rug. He envied their sloth, not for the first time. 

He got up and made a cuppa mechanically, not really thinking actively about what his hands were doing. He was computing how many videos and chats he'd have to do weekly in order to make up for this loss of income. 

It was _unfathomable_ . His aging body would never keep up. He was already eating and hydrating constantly just for his two nights a week. Without someone to make the videos with, he'd never breach that threshold for income where he was actively making porn instead of _wanking with friends_. Crowley thought about searching for someone with whom to make the videos and blanched at the idea, as ever. Especially now, with a bloody plague going on and limited contact being encouraged. Who on earth was he going to find that he both knew comfortably enough and would not be fussy about it?

And either way, he had to talk to Zira, and soon. 

* * *

“Angel?” Crowley knocked on Zira’s door twice and tried the knob later that evening. It was locked. _Curious_. He frowned at the door and checked his phone. Surely Zira hadn’t gone out for their evening walk without him? And it was barely gone six, he certainly wouldn’t be in bed. They hadn't even had dinner yet. And besides, unless he was working Crowley almost always went to bed before Zira did, the night owl. He frowned deeper and started to go downstairs into the shop, texting while he descended. 

**C- You go out without me?**

He heard the answering ping in Zira’s flat, however. Halfway down the stairs, he turned and glared up at the door. “Alright then,” he said to himself. Either Zira was having a very impromptu nap or he was ignoring Crowley for some reason. 

**C- K. i’m ordering deliveroo. Answer me asap if you want a curry or a kebab. Sitar**

Crowley went back into his flat and shut the door, opening the app and starting an order for their current little favorite curry shop round the corner that was still open and offering contactless delivery. He waited the ten minutes and, with no answer forthcoming, he added a paneer masala and extra naan to his kebab and bengan bhurtha and hit _complete order_. If Zira didn’t want it, he’d just eat the leftovers himself. Probably in a pit of despair on his sofa while bingeing Golden Girls reruns. Tomorrow. Because he had nothing better to do during the day now. 

Crowley groaned into his palms and let himself ooze forward across the worktop into a dramatic heap. He wanted very badly to put on his Comfy and thick socks and become one of the sofa cushions. Bentley quipped a curious _mrow_ at him and coiled around one ankle. “No Zira tonight, old girl. Just you’n me. And that lazy sod,” he nodded at Ash, who was asleep in the Fiddle Leaf again. The tip of their tail dangled out in a deceptively playful curl which he had fussed at Bentley for batting at earlier.

It was feeding night, so he had to fetch the mouse he’d been thawing since yesterday out of the designated, hideously orange, mouse-thawing tupperware in the fridge and put it by the terrarium and then scoop Ash out of the plant. The panda piebald didn’t appreciate having their nap interrupted and hissed, pink tongue flickering at Crowley before sticking the wet thing in his ear as they wound around Crowley’s shoulder. “Here ya go. I got you a fat one, see? Enjoy it, you thankless oaf.” Crowley watched with his usual morbid sort of fascination as Ash sized up and caught the mouse and slowly swallowed it. 

He had been forcing himself to not think about it all day but the tidal wave of emotion bowled him over with sudden and razing accuracy. He hoped desperately that he wouldn’t have to leave here. That Zira would let him stay and be understanding about his job cutting him loose. The news had said that housing was protected, and Crowley had spent much of the afternoon (between emotional breakdowns and forcing himself to take open video chats on Onlyfans which only served to make him feel even more drained and hollowed-out right now) furiously googling the laws that he could show Zira if it became an issue. He didn't think it would come to that. He didn't want to think that of Zira at all. But some niggling part of his hindering told him to be prepared anyway. After all, look where minimal planning had got him. Kicked out by an ex at 43, homeless, in a tiny bedsit above a restoration shop with a fussy flatmate. Half his savings drained and selling his body and time online to make up for it. Now fired from the only steady job he'd ever had, and for what? Something he had no control over whatsoever. Nothing he could have planned for in a hundred years, but there he was trying to plan ahead again, anyway. 

But now- stood here staring at his only constant companions who were innocent in all this and who looked only to him to keep them happy and healthy- the dam broke. A harsh sob tore out of his throat before he could clap a hand to his mouth. Just as the tears started coming, his stress finally hitting the breaking point, there was a ping on his phone- the curry delivery, and a knock at his door. Before he could choke out a desperate _wait_ , Zira pushed the door open with an apologetic smile, phone in hand open to his messages, and caught sight of him standing there in his sitting room weeping like an idiot while the snake swallowed a thawed frozen feeder mouse. Zira's face fell into a mask of pure concern immediately and he rushed forward with his hands out, ready to grasp and soothe. Ready to hold his friend together if need be. 

" _Darling_!" Zira gasped, gripping Crowley’s knobby elbows. "What's happened?"

"I gotta- the food's here. _Hnng--_ hang on," Crowley hiccuped between hitching breaths and smeared the back of his hand under his nose and made to squeeze around Zira but his friend grabbed his wrist. 

"I'll go fetch it, my dear. You sit, or get some water. Here,” he handed Crowley one of his own water bottles from a flat pack of them and tugged his waistcoat down like he did when he was worried. He shot Crowley a wan smile. “Back in two shakes," he said gently, pushing Crowley again toward his own sofa before heading out to the stairs down to the street door where the deliveroo driver had dropped the contactless delivery. The redhead went, hanging his head in his hands as he sat and waited, counting Zira’s thumping steps down and back up the stairs. 

Zira came back in a moment with heavy, fragrant bags from _Sitar_ and a thankful but concerned smile on his face. He set everything down on the worktop and zeroed in on Crowley again, coming over to kneel in front of him by the sofa. "Now, would you like to tell me what's happened, or should we get right into a distraction? Telly and dinner? Maybe one of your serial killer documentaries?"

Zira is openly dismayed when Crowley curls into his knees and cries even harder at this small offering of kindness. His chest is hitching and there is a terrible sound squeezing out of his throat and Zira finds he can't take it at all. He scoots forward between Crowley's ankles and pushes him up until the lanky man can drape against him, drawing in for a tight hug even with his slim arms trapped against his chest and his palms pressed to his face, trying to hide. "There now dear. You'll manage, whatever it is that's got you so upset. You've been spectacular since you got here and that won't change." He rubs soothing circles against Crowley's ribs and shoulder blades and waits, listening to his breaths evening out slowly. "I'll help, too, you know. You're not alone in it, not if you don't want to be." 

Crowley sniffles wetly and nods, taking a shuddering breath. He huffs against Zira's neck and pulls away, embarrassed and shy. "I _do_ want to watch a serial killer doc," he says through hiccups. Zira grins and nods, a thumb ticking back and forth along the seam of Crowley's leggings along the outside of his thigh. 

"Alright. I'll get plates and flatware, you get the show selected." He pats Crowley's knee and pulls away to stand and go rifle through his friend's kitchen, confused at the outburst but willing to let it slide if Crowley doesn't want to talk about it. 

Zira decides that Crowley will explain if he wants to, and otherwise it's none of Zira's business. He quietly wonders if it has to do with Luc again (the beast of a man has tried contacting Crowley several times and even showed up at the door once during lockdown, but Zira sent him packing with his best “anti-customer-service” face and he hasn’t returned), or what chaos is going on outside their walls, or money troubles, or if he just slept poorly, or anything else it could possibly be. By the time he's come back with Crowley's black, white-flecked melamine plates and forks and napkins, the other man has unfurled onto the floor so he can eat off the low coffee table. He's sat on a flat, circular, pintucked, black, velvet cushion and a matching one in maroon is beside him, thoughtfully ready for Zira's own bum. The blonde sets everything down and settles himself on the cushion to plate up the food. 

He pushes a plate laden with kebab and naan and roasted aubergine toward Crowley with a paneer cube on one edge, because he knows Crowley will steal one anyway, so he might as well head him off early. For himself he piles up basmati rice and the paneer masala and tears his naan into pinchable bite-sized pieces with which he plans to pick up his cheese and eat it. Crowley has selected a documentary about a Scottish serial killer and Zira double-takes at the name, recalling the case from when he was growing up. “He favors you,” he comments, chewing thoughtfully. Crowley wrinkles his nose at the actor on screen and shakes his head. In lieu of a probably-scathing comment, he puts the paneer cube in his mouth and stares at his plate a moment and then looks up at Zira, watery around the eyes again. 

“My dear,” Zira admonishes, putting his fork down. “Tell me what has happened to upset you like this? Did Luc call again?” 

“No, angel. It’s… ngk. It’s not like that. I-- _fuck_. I got furloughed today. Probably terminated, in the end. They said to wait it out.” Crowely pokes at his plate miserably and his bottom lip trembles. Zira takes a breath, reeling in his immediate reaction of shock amd the overpowering need to squeeze this pain out of his dearest friend. “I still have one of my side hustles. I can make up the rent there, probably. At least for a little while. I just can’t believe they came for me, I thought with my tenure I was good. Safe, at least able to be demoted and kept on. But apparently not.” 

“I’m so sorry, darling. I can’t imagine with all that’s going on that you are alright, right now, but I want you to know that even without the laws in place to protect your tenancy here I would _never_ have turned you out. I know you’ve been working three jobs even on your own steam before the lockdown was ordered, and I know you aren’t a slouch. And I’d like to think that you knew that going into this conversation and that these tears are over the loss of your job and not nervousness or fear over telling me.” 

Crowley’s mouth is trembling again and Zira’s resolve to keep his hands to himself after the embrace earlier buckles entirely. He scoots closer so that he can gather the other man into a hug and Crowley sniffles into his shoulder wetly for a few minutes before puling back. He seems to have gotten over the worst of his nerves and is embarrassed to have had two breakdowns in front of his landlord in under thirty minutes. Zira squeezes his biceps and lets him go. They resettle on their respective cushions and finish the first episode of the serial killer show and change to the more neutral territory of Doctor Who, which Zira likes well enough but he doesn’t own a television, so he only watches it with Crowley. 

“What’s wrong with Ash?” Zira asks some time later, eyeing the bulge in the middle of the snake while he pets Bentley, who has sprawled across her owner’s shins and Zira’s lap with limbs as long and carelessly tucked into Zira’s curves and valleys as Crowley’s own legs and feet usually are. As a matter of fact, Zira has his other hand on Crowley’s slim ankle draped across his lap and it feels _exactly_ as tantalizingly seductive as Zira had daydreamed about months ago. He ticks his thumb over the whorl of bone protruding from the delicate joint there and glances over to Crowley’s face, which is a placid mask of contentment. His eyes are drooping from his emotional rollercoaster of a day and the heavy food, thought it's barely ten o'clock. Zira wants to tuck him into bed and wishes he could curl up there with him; to hold this sensitive, sweet man through the night and convince him that everything will turn out alright. Even if it's not according to _their_ plans; it's ineffable. 

But he can’t tuck Crowley into bed and hold him against his chest and soothe his fears away with kisses and cuddles, so he settles for stroking Crowley’s ankle and his cat and waits to hear about the strange lump inside his snake. “It’s feeding day, angel. They eat about once a week or so. The lump is a mouse I fed them earlier. Before you came. You can hold ‘em if you want?” 

Zira’s eyes go wide. He has stroked the snake’s head exactly once and while he is not scared of it, per se, he has not tried to come into contact with Ash more than sitting near them by accident. “I… uhm. Sure?” 

Crowley snorts and stretches his way to standing. He steps in front of Zira and reaches in the terrarium, gently scooping out the snoozing snake who is too lethargic with digesting to be terribly concerned about being handled. Crowley comes back to sit on the sofa, close enough to be touching Zira along the lengths of their thighs, and holds Ash up to transfer them to Zira’s outstretched hands. The snake flickers a tongue at him and otherwise lays across his two flattened palms, only looping the end of their tail where a black spot is in a perfect circle laid atop the white of its body. Ash has three splotches of black along their back, and an otherwise pearly white exterior with dark eyes and a pink mouth. Apparently Crowley had wanted an axanthic "stormtrooper" ball python at the exhibit he and a friend had gone to, but Luc had preferred this particular snake in the photos he sent back, and so Ash is who Crowley had gotten. 

"Quite the accident, really. Not unlike this dork, who I got from a coworker who was breeding longhair Orientals and wound up with a short-hair by some mysterious coincidence. She saw me take a shine to this one and let me keep her, since she was the oddball." He scritches behind Bentley's batlike ears and earns a swipe for his trouble. "Brat." Bemtley has luminous yellow eyes that rival the honey-gold of Crowley himself, and Zira find himself spiraling into a pit of helpless fondness he doesn't quite know how to rail against.

Ultimately he decides to go home, after putting the snake away to sleep off its dinner and pushing Bentley to the sofa cushions and bidding Crowley goodnight. 

He goes to his room and curls up and tries to read, but nothing sticks and he ends up reading the same lines over and over until he finally sets the book down. 

Zira thinks that he needs to take a step back, to give Crowley some space now that he has lost his main source of income. Exposing his attraction now is poor timing, and could make the other man think he is desirous of sex to keep a roof over his head, which is hardly it at all. His desires to be with Crowley run deep, such that he is in a constant state of wanting to hold his hand, or kiss him as he heads downstairs to work. 

It's ridiculous, and he must get a lid on it, soon. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you want to see what Bentley and Ash look like, google Black Oriental Shorthair and Panda Piebald Ball Pything, respectively. i am going to try to embed images but i have never done it so i may fail. forgive me.
> 
> Smut continues next chapter as Crowley tries to navigate bring jobless and still making money, despite Zira's reassurance that he will not be evicted. Will his secret side hustle be revealed? If so, how?


	4. Exposure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley has a close call with Gabriel and Zira puzzles out a secret. 
> 
> Opens with smut, beware.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy St Paddy's! Have a beer and some light angst on me!   
> I HATE THIS CHAPTER! I'm flinging it onto the internet before I stare at it much longer amd make things worse. This was hard to write, partially because I've had a rather horrible week.   
> I hope you guys like it. Thank you so much for the love so far  
>  ❤🖤😇🐍

**Chapter 4** : 

Crowley gasps, hips jolting as he braces back for the next strike. The good-paying client is on: Ken Doll, and he's making his usual demands. 

"One notch higher," he says, fisting his own cock. Crowley can hear the slick sound of it and keens, wanting to move a hand down to grip himself similarly. Ken Doll had him loop a yoga tie against his headboard and cuff his hands in it earlier, drawn up above his head with the remote of the fucking machine clenched in his fist. They aren't tied tight, only loose cuffs he has wrapped around his wrists to give the impression of being bound. The machine, however, is testing his limits. 

He's already taken  _ seven  _ calls today, and Ken Doll, as usual, is his last. Thankfully two of the previous clients were just softcore stuff, touching himself teasingly and talking them through their orgasms; he could have happily done that over the phone but they paid extra for visuals, and he’s not exactly in a position to turn down the money. One other person had him dance a bit, which is always fun but slightly awkward. So Crowley is already weak in the knees and hips from his earlier work and Ken Doll is  _ apparently  _ intent on wearing him out and then kicking him headfirst into an early grave. He tweaks the machine up one more notch as requested and howls into the pillow corner bitten between his teeth as the dildo pounds into his arse at a merciless rate. He flexes his hips once, twice, and it's over; he's coming on his sheets without a hand on him like he's twenty instead of forty-three. 

The stimulation of the machine is quickly far too much to bear and as soon as he's done squeezing against the stilled length inside, he pulls off it and rolls over so Ken Doll can see his wet-streaked belly and utter exhaustion. 

"Gonna come on me, luv?" He asks the ceiling, breathy and sated. Ken Doll groans, his hand working faster until he spills with a wet squelch of skin on skin. Crowley heaves a sigh and slowly sits up, tugging a damp flannel into the shot to wipe at himself. 

"That was nice, gorgeous. You get better at taking it like I ask every time." 

Crowley preens and smiles at the man on the screen. Ken Doll is still nameless (which is fine, he only knows Crowley as 666xy_d€mon) but he has taken to showing his face lately. Crowley supposed he's handsome enough, though not exactly his type. His eyes are an unsettling shade of almost-purple indigo. 

Crowley still dresses up despite some of the anonymity being dropped. Tonight he's in a long blonde wig and blue contacts and makeup that contours his face a little rounder. He knows he looks silly blonde, but the point is to obscure his features enough that someone shopping in bloody Asda doesn’t recognize him while he’s picking out food to tempt Zira with like a male penguin carefully selecting rocks to impress a mate. Ridiculous behavior, really. 

And then Ken Doll asks what Crowley has known is coming for a while now. 

"So listen, sweetheart. I know you're in London, somewhere. Me too. Would you be willing to- Ah. Meet up? I'd pay, of course. More than I already do."

"Ex…  _ what _ ?" 

"Well, sorry to  _ assume  _ but you don't seem like you do this for fun, it's clearly about making money. And if not, no worries. I can stay on like this. Just thought I'd ask. Can't say yes if I don't ask," he booms in that grating American lilt, and Crowley can see his straight-toothed salesman smile glittering even through the medium of the shitty laptop cam. 

He winces and looks away for a moment. "Ngk. I don't… I don't know. I'm not " _ there _ " yet. I don't think. This medium preserves my anonymity somewhat, and meeting people would…  _ could _ ruin that. I don't think I'm ready for that." 

"Fair enough, think about it though, sweetheart. You could come to mine, or we could meet at a hotel. I think the nice ones are back open... Shit, we could both wear masks and shower separately afterward for all I care, haha," Ken Doll shrugs and reaches out of the shot for his phone. He clicks around and Crowley watches the deposit for tonight's call light up his own mobile screen. "Next week?" 

"Sure, jus’ text me. Ta," Crowley signs off and struggles not to feel vaguely sick at the proposition he'd just suffered, even though he had been expecting it. 

He was supposed to make a video today, but he's exhausted down to his bones and so dehydrated he's sure he couldn't come again if his life depended on it. He gathers his toys on shaky knees and waddles out to the kitchen to wash them. 

Bentley chirps awake from her tree in the window and trots across the sitting room at the sight of him. She hops up onto the counter beside the sink and he flicks her with water playfully, earning a filthy look from her giant, luminous eyes. "Wanna curl up and watch some telly, old girl?" He dries his hands and scritches her chin and takes his toys back to the spare room to put them away, peeling off the lingerie and sniffing it carefully. The bralette had escaped his sweat and come, but the knickers are filthy, so he tosses them in the bin for the laundry and goes to shower carrying two bottles of water. 

Crowley centers the hot spray on his lower back and chugs one bottle of water and then half of the other. He considers the idea of salty takeout and pestering Zira into an evening of lounging and chatting against the likelihood that he will fall asleep as soon as he is comfortable and fed up. Not likely to be an exhilarating evening for the blonde, so he decides he'll cook a frozen pizza and go to bed. It's barely half nine, but Ken Doll drains him without mercy every time. 

He pays well, though. 

Crowley lets his hair out of his wig cap and washes it, scrapes away the rest of the gunk on him with a sugar scrub and then a shower lotion. He scrubs sweat off his face and makeup too, some black grit in his eye from it, and steps out feeling polished and exceptionally clean, if shockingly sore between the legs. 

_ Oof. Paracetamol and ice pack time _ . 

He steps out of the bathroom once dried and pads naked to the kitchen and unwraps a pizza, pops it in. He wraps a soft ice pack in a kitchen towel and goes looking for his Comfy and tugs it on with nothing else and goes out to sit on the ice pack on the sofa and play on his phone while his dinner cooks. 

He jolts awake to a banging on his door and the room filled with smoke. " _ Crowley _ !" Zira’s outside and the door is deadbolted because he’d been  _ working _ . 

"Shit!" He jumps up, the ice pack dropping to the floor, and flings the door open and rushes to the cooker, turning it off and then runs across to the windows to throw them open. Zira is wide-eyed and alert but seems to feel better to see it was just a cooking accident. Burning dinner is nothing he is unused to, and is even a common enough occurrence that Crowley’s been subjugated to his sad briquette offerings more than once. They almost always order in when it happens. He nods, visibly relaxing, and goes back to his flat and returns a moment later carrying something all too familiar. 

"Are you alright my dear?" He asks, plugging in a small box fan to help spread the smoke out to the window. 

“Yeah, sorry, just fell asleep with a pizza in. I can’t believe the smell didn’t wake me up before you did, jeez,” Crowley coughs lightly, wafting smoke out the window with a baking sheet. “Didn’t mean to bother you at all tonight, angel. I was just gonna eat and go to bed.” 

“Well. you can’t eat  _ that _ ,” Zira chuckles and pokes at the charcoal remains of the pizza. Crowley’s stomach lurches and he frowns down at it. 

“Yeah, right." He scrubs his eyes and yawns, blinking them open just to see Zira staring oddly at him. "Guess it’s sandwich time.” he becomes uncomfortably aware of what he's wearing a split second later when Zira's eyes track down his body with a question or two glinting in his baby blues. The Comfy is suddenly intensely hot and humid despite his utter nakedness underneath and it is the  _ worst possible _ thing he could be wearing in front of  _ Zira _ . He flushes to his roots and turns away a bit awkwardly. 

"Uh, let me go put bottoms on." And he disappears into the bedroom, leaving the door closed over as Zira starts talking again so they don't have to shout. 

“Or I erm... have some greek leftovers, if you want them? The remains of a gyro and a salad. I have lettuce in, and pita,” Zira tilts his head and smiles as Crowley emerges in leggings and a soft tee shirt, knowing full well that Crowley will give in if he looks innocent and unassuming enough. He's holding the cat who is purring loudly and looking smug. 

Crowley sighs and growls under his breath at the small manipulation. He knows he'll cave, too. “Alright, yes,  _ fine _ , lead the way.” 

“Of course,” Zira demurrs and bends to put Bentley down and pet her enormous ears and turns on his heel to lead the redhead across to his own kitchen and sitting room. “Sit your wary old bones, my dear, I'll get this warmed up. Do you like it with the tzatziki and feta?” 

“Yeah, ta.” Crowley collapses into one of the wingback chairs and lets his head loll around, watching the blonde microwave his meat and pita and arrange a salad with some fresh lettuce and the unopened little cup of the restaurant’s homemade dressing and a few toppings out of his fridge while chattering about his day to fill the silence. Zira brings it over and then goes back for the hot plate. “Thanks, angel. 's nice,” Crowley says, yawning hugely and propping himself up to eat. It is delicious, and he harbors regrets about not having just come over here to eat when he already wanted to. He eats the salad and the meat and picks at a triangle of pita and falls backward into the chair and feels even closer to sleep than he had before he nearly burnt the shop down with a frozen fucking pizza. 

“You’ve been so tired lately. Have you found some work?” Zira asks carefully. He takes the plates up and dumps them and brings back two cups of steaming chamomile. 

“Nah, just the old hustles. Still hoping the insurance calls me to come back. The furlough checks are better than nothing but I’m still salty about the whole thing. Which, by the way, I was going to wire the rent in tomorrow. Got the deposit tonight from a uh. Client.” Crowley winces at his wording, hating it immediately, but Zira doesn’t question it. 

How in the everlasting fuck did he land an apartment with the single most unassuming man in London? Who was also unbelievably fucking cute and handsome and nice and caring-- and Crowley bit his tongue to stop the flood of thoughts before they wound up building up into a spectacular meltdown. He was far too tired to deal with himself right now, let alone a gently questioning, perfect Zira. 

“I’m entirely too exhausted to make any sense right now, angel. I’m going to bed,” he pitches forward in his seat and stands with a groan. His legs and everything in between are still wobbly and tender. “Bentley follow us over?” 

“Oh, yes I believe so.” he nods toward the chesterfield between his bookcases and Crowley snorts at her where she is coiled in a leggy ball. He saunters over and scoops her up with a  _ mrrp _ , glancing over the books as he straightens. 

“ _ Maurice _ ?” he asks, mostly to himself. It’s one of a few that aren’t dusty on this shelf, indicating recent or at least often usage. 

Zira has frozen in his seat, looking rather like he’s been caught-out doing something questionable instead of sitting there sharing his leftovers with his neighbor. “Oh, erm. Yes. it’s rather good. An old favorite, i suppose.” 

“Hmmm. Dun know it was a book. I like the movie, though. Maurice had a nice arse.” Crowley hitches Bentley up his chest more and flips the book over, squinting at the back cover in the din. There is nothing on it, of course, Zira has re-bound this well-loved favorite himself even though it wasn’t a first edition and was hardly worth the resources. But the paperback had gone ragged, and so he intervened. 

“Take it if you like. And perhaps we should watch the film after you read the book? See if it’s just as charming?” Crowley nods and smiles at Zira, fighting another jaw-cracking yawn. “Alright, bugger off, you. Back to bed. And no more cooking!” 

“Yeah, yeah, no trouble there. Let’s watch the film this weekend, eh? Make a night of it. I’ll read your bloody book. Not got any pictures of nice arses in it, though?”

“No,” Zira giggles. “But I’m sure I’ll agree with you this weekend when you show me the film. Though I've always been more partial to Scudder being the handsome one.” 

“Nah, you just have a soft spot for hot, poor things who need to be looked after,” Crowley said and then blushed furiously. “Ah- fuck. Sorry, I’m-- clearly losing my filter. G-goodnight.“ and with that, he was across the hall and locking his door. Zira stared at the door for a moment and backed into his own flat, and decided chamomile wasn’t quite going to cut it tonight. 

______

On friday, the two flatmates sat side-by-side on the sofa in Crowley's sitting room. They had a huge bucket of salty popcorn between them and wine glasses in hand with a bottle on the low table in front.  _ Maurice _ was playing, and both of the men on the sofa were in hell. 

Crowley, imagining himself as the lower-classed Scudder, had now been pining for the angel next to him for what felt like 6000 years instead of 6 months. He wanted badly to be curled into the soft curve of Zira's belly, his heavy arm draped around his shoulders as they watched a film together. Not… whatever weird too-friendly friendship this was. He didn't know how to bridge the gap, and the fear of losing everything was too much to bear. 

Zira, similarly, was afraid. Not for being outed, like poor Maurice was in his beloved book, though both main men in the film were attractive, but because he felt that same ache of awakened love and affection and felt it withheld from them both out of some blind fear. He wanted nothing more than to hold Crowley close and watch this film, or to curl together in bed and feel the warmth and pressure of another person beside him. Crowley, specifically. Preferably. But he was afraid most of all that reaching out would be awkward. Could ruin everything the had tentatively built up. 

Instead of talking about it, he pulled Crowley's long legs into his lap and held his skinny ankles amd let his thumb tick over the bone like he was won't to do, and Crowley smiled and it was good. 

By the end of the night, Zira was thoroughly miserable enough that he went back to his rooms and didn't even muster the energy for his typical furious wank over the redhead. He simply crawled into bed and lay there fretting for hours. 

__________

It finally happened the third week of June, when everything was opened up and people were starting to move around the city in droves again. 

Zira had been insistent on masks in his shop for the few people who filtered in and out, and he only had one customer who refused to comply. 

Gabriel was standing in his customary straight-backed aloof position in the middle of Zira's shop, talking loudly about his client who expected top shelf treatment and would spare no expense. Of course they wouldn't- that's why Gabriel came to Zira instead of someone cheaper. 

Zira handed back the finished gilded family Bible he'd done last week and brought up the scripts for the new projects- a war journal and two ladies' diaries from the Great War. He ran a hand over each lovingly and handed over the paperwork. 

"So I will need these three by the end of the month," Gabriel boomed, signing the contracts and handing them back. He's still talking, telling Zira how to do his job, really. Zira winced behind his mask and hoped his eyes didn't give his annoyance away.

While Gabriel was still describing exactly how he wants the spine redone and the gold lettering re-flaked on one of the diaries, the front door clanged loudly and Crowley came stomping in with the shopping and his mask dangling from one hand. 

"Oi! Angel! Oh, there you are. Look, they didn't have any--" Crowley stopped dead and stared at Gabriel who stared right back, looking equally as shocked, and turned beet red. "I- uh," he turned and all but fled up the stairs, slamming his door. 

Zira and Gabriel glanced at one another and Zira noticed the American's cheeks were faintly pink. Zira frowned, immediately curious and a bit peeved, if he were being honest. 

Gabriel cleared his throat and took his portion of the contract and slipped it into his messenger bag. "Hmm. I'll call you about the books in a few weeks. Have a good one," and he quickly went out without lingering another second. 

"What on earth…" Zira mused to himself and shook his head. He put two of the books into his safe and began work on the third. 

By the time his stomach is rumbling for lunch, he is shocked that Crowley hasn't slunk down to confront him about the awkward encounter earlier or to ask him to lunch like nothing happened at all. He decides he'll have to be the one to approach, and puts his tools away. He locks up the shop and goes upstairs and hesitates outside Crowley's door. 

Crowley answers a few moments after he knocked, enough time for Zira to second guess himself a thousand times and start to move away. "Hey angel. I, uh… sorry if I spooked your client." He stands back and let's Zira come in, and they move to sit on the sofa, knees angled together at the center of it. 

"You did no such thing, darling. I am concerned though. How do you know Gabriel? He's not exactly… what I'd consider to be your cup of tea." 

"Oh jeez, is that his name? I never knew it. And he doesn't know mine, so I hope you didn't say it after I scarpered. It's just… it's weird? Okay? And no, he's a bloody  _ menace _ . Only keep him around for his money, that one." 

Zira let's Bentley crawl into his lap and frowns, trying to understand Crowley's particular vocabulary of non-speech. He fails. "What is weird?" 

Crowley holds his face in his hands and growls lightly. "I just… fuck. I know him from… online stuff." 

"Oh, you met online?" Zira knows about The Grindr. He knows there are places online that hot young things converge to hook up. His stomach sinks, understanding that if Crowley  _ likes _ Gabriel, well he could hardly ever view Zira in the same light. "I see." 

"No.  _ No _ ! You  _ don't _ ! You're making the face, and I don't trust it. I'm-- we're not  _ together _ . I've never even seen him in real life til today, though he has asked." Zira still looks vaguely sad for some unaccountable reason and Crowley wants to vomit. "We just. Uhm. Wank? Like over the phone or on video chat. I hadn't even seen his face til a month or so ago." 

"My dear, you don't owe me an explanation for what you do with your life." 

"I know, angel. But. I-- I dunno. Part of me wants to, and part of me is afraid that you'll keep me at arms length if you knew. Two arms' length, hah. I- fuck. You're gonna find out, clearly. Jesus." He scrubs his knuckles into his eyes and sighs heavily. "D'you know what Onlyfans is?" 

Zira frowns. "No." 

"Right. It's a creative selling site for people to sell stuff they make or do online to clients. Sometimes it's just artists, celebrities doing virtual meet-and-greets. Sometimes it's… porn." Crowley winces and suddenly it clicks. 

Zira's mind maybe short-circuits a bit. "Oh. You do the pornographic sort? With… with Gabriel?" 

"Ugh,  _ no _ . Gross. He's one of my clients. I just… I dunno. I talk to them, sometimes I have a wank too. Sometimes they have… requests. Gabriel is pretty demanding but he pays well. He's been replenishing my lost savings as much as anything else." Crowley still won't look at him and it's awful. They are glancing at everything in the room aside from one another. Bentley paws at Zira's waistcoat buttons to demand affection. He obediently, mindlessly pets her and finally glances at Crowley's miserable face. 

"Do... you  _ enjoy _ it?" 

"Ehhh… it's exhausting, to be honest. I'm too old to keep up, some days. But I'm hoping to get back to the office soon," he stares at his dusty computer area, untouched since May. "Then maybe I can do less. It brings in the extra I can't make at my regular job to put back what Luc stole. That's it. I'm not…  _ invested _ or anything. I'll gladly stop when I break even." 

"Oh. So you don't…" Zira pauses and twists his hands together, a move Croeley has only seen him do in front of difficult customers who are making him uncomfortable. "You don't  _ like _ Gabriel?" 

Crowley inhales sharply and stares at Zira's face. He takes the leap. "No, you daft idiot. I like  _ you _ ." 

**Author's Note:**

> I love comments and generally try my best to reply to each one. This fic is about halfway written, so gaps between postings will hopefully be brief. Please leave me some feedback, knowing my work is appreciated helps me write faster and better.


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